Video: The obligatory “Josh Howard sneers at the national anthem” clip

posted at 11:05 am on September 18, 2008 by Allahpundit

Two clips for you, the first a local news report in which fans show their “appreciation” and the second the raw footage. Click the image to watch. Not the first multimillionaire to show contempt for his country, needless to say, and not even the first time he himself has snubbed it: He declined a chance to play on the Olympic team two years ago because it interfered with his summer camps. Expect him to be booed for maybe five games, and then as his PPG inches up towards 20, bygones will quickly be bygones.

Breaking on Hot Air

Blowback

Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.

I like watching pro sports. And what this jackass says, thinks or does, has no bearing on my life. None. Just like the idiots in Hollywood or in the recording industry.

Whereas idiots like Pelosi, Reid and the entire Democrat clown Congress DO have bearings on my life.

Don’t like anti-American a-holes like Howard? The proper answer to it is to defeat Democrat politicians at every level of government, down to the PTA. Without Democrats voting how people like Howard want, people like Howard have no power.

He scheduled to take “Advanced communication skills sessions” Sure he sounds as dumb as a rock but improving his communications skills isn’t going to improve his hatred of America.
He needs a pay decrease and time off.

Seriously though it never ceases to amaze me that conservatives, who extoll the virtues of “colorblindness” and decry identity politics are unable to shut up about race whenever a black person says or does something objectionable.

crr6 on September 18, 2008 at 11:56 AM

Where the hell have you been hanging out? Race is almost never cited when someone comments here, unless the issue itself concerns race. I might point out that the subject of our conversation here brought up race himself, so how about you have half a clue about who introduced the race card before smearing an entire political ideology?

I cannot understand why a “professional” athlete does not honor our National Anthem. Does he also burn flags?

m064404

Thanks to a linked article generously provided by another contributor on this thread, I was able to discover that he doesn’t burn flag…hemp…he likes to burn hemp.

Damned neighborly of him…the stuff clogs highway drainage ditches and the edges of woodlots all across the midwest…down here in Atascosa County, folks burn cactus. He burns hemp…agriculturally minded fellow, this….

Big surprise, this sorry a/o is employed by Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks. The same Mark Cuban who financed the movie “Redacted”, a docudrama based on the Mahmudiyah killings in Iraqi in 2006……by guess who?…. U.S. soldiers! John Murtha b/s. I know this sorry liberal b***** personally and believe me, he is a total prick! Also, he’s trying to buy the Chicago Cubs.
……perhaps the billionaire play/boy wants to get closer to the ONE.

OK look. I am a Josh Howard fan because I watched his career at Wake Forest from when he was a freshman.

Josh is a good guy who works extraordinarily hard in his profession. He didn’t have the talent that others had but he worked his butt off to earn a spot in the League.

I’m not justifying what he said. I actually was EXTREMELY critical of comments he made after winning the ACC POY his senior year at the dawn of the Iraq War and mentioned that the war was ‘for oil’ because ‘Saddam tried to kill his daddy’.

I was extremely critical of him there because of the context. He was representing the school, the ACC, etc and shouldn’t have said it in that context.

Here, he’s just goofing around with some friends and someone video taped it. It’s MEANINGLESS. Howard has always been a lightning-rod for how he plays. He’s always on edge and fights for everything (legally) on the court. He just works hard and has found success.

I’m not excusing what he said, just that what he said matters. This video was from 6 months ago. It is irrelevant. Most of you don’t even know who Howard is. . . but he is a good guy who has made poor decisions. But he has earned everything he has gotten – ie he isn’t one of those who is so much better than everyone he doesn’t have to work.

Dude. Another underachieving, dope smokin’ wannabe gangsta millionaire trying to fit in with the prominent, tired Hip-Hop BLT themes? Yawn. He’s done anyway. Everybody knows that you don’t give him the ball when it counts. He’s simply lashing out at his own mediocrity.

Out here in SLC, D-will and Booz served proudly along side (I never thought I’d say this about Kobe) a man who really gets it. We couldn’t be more proud of our boys. Strong commmunity guys with skills, making mad cash and loving every minute of it. It’s the American dream and they realize it.

OK look. I am a Josh Howard fan because I watched his career at Wake Forest from when he was a freshman…

I’m not justifying what he said. I actually was EXTREMELY critical of comments he made after winning the ACC POY his senior year at the dawn of the Iraq War and mentioned that the war was ‘for oil’ because ‘Saddam tried to kill his daddy’.

Here, he’s just goofing around with some friends and someone video taped it. It’s MEANINGLESS…

I’m not excusing what he said, just that what he said matters. This video was from 6 months ago. It is irrelevant…

ThackerAgenc

First of all, you are excusing what he said.

Secondly, what he does for a living is play. Ultimately, it’s lucrative, but it isn’t important.

Remarks as foul as this, even those recorded in a private conversation made public, which aren’t immediately addressed by the person speaking and, not falling back on the standard canard of “context” or “mischaracterized” or even “I’m sorry my remarks were misunderstood” (as if the listener is at fault for misinterpreting a fairly clear statement)…but rather apologizing now, completely.

If he

does

feel that, as a black man, he feels no tie to America (as represented by the Anthem), he should start a discussion of just that thing. But, allowing the team to address his dismissive bilge is cowardly.

I don’t care what sort of a player he is. O.J. Simpson, in his sport, was the sort of an athlete this weenie will never be. They’re in the same class.

This sort of business must be met immediately. It promotes racial disharmony. The majority of black Americans are good citizens and good neighbors, and this zero’s statement was a refutation of that.

I’m still waiting for someone in the “black community” to step up and denounce what was said. Maybe it’s not being reported….

I don’t think you understand the meaning of ‘excusing what he said’. I am not saying that he should say what he said. I can’t imagine he even thinks or believes it. What he said was WRONG. How is that for ‘excusing’ what he said?

It’s not as though he is pro-actively making an anti-American movie like Cuban the owner. It’s not like he’s addressing more than ONE or TWO people here. It’s not like he’s asking for approval. He’s goofing around.

Josh is a lightning rod. He got tons of technical fouls in college. His political comments at random shouldn’t be fodder for general condemnation of everyone and everything.

By the way, I had hoped that the ACC POY incident would teach him the lesson not to say these things in public. That’s the main reason I was EXTREMELY critical of him – TO HIS FACE – during that incident. And I was then and still am one of his staunchest supporters. He’s a local kid who’s had a rough time, but he’s done pretty good for himself.

This incident isn’t his best (needless to say), and it shouldn’t have happened.

I disagree. He ‘gets’ what this country is about and is clearly devoted to his love and appreciation for it. His post game interview (forget which specific game) at the olympics shows this. It is in stark contrast to the behavior of Howard’s.

Josh is a lightning rod. He got tons of technical fouls in college. His political comments at random shouldn’t be fodder for general condemnation of everyone and everything.

ThackerAgency

…point taken, so here’s my point:

Basketball is unimportant. On the scale of human achievement, it ranks somewhere between bridge and breakdancing…both require skill, but the human race would be none the worse if they’d never been invented.

America is important.

Black people feeling themselves a part of America is important. When some douchbag celebrity — whatever the history of his personal conduct or his learning lessons, etc. — comes out and says this sort of codswollop (be it hijacked private blather or no) it puts black people at a distance. By that I don’t just mean that it effects black peoples’ thinking…it effects (once again) the thinking of all their neighbors.

…ask South Texas hispanics what they think of the “black struggle” some time…opinion is mixed, to put it charitably….

The guy should come out and address the matter himself. If this is his honest opinion, let the chips fall where they may…let’s clear the air.

Once again…basketball is a sport…sport, however remunerative, is an amusement, and ultimately is a luxury. America is home.

SKYBOX:
Sorry. I didn’t see your comment.
Btw-The Cubbies are losing by 3 in the 8th.
I live about 4 miles or so North of Wrigley.
Wrigley’s been like poison to the Cubs lately.
If they don’t clich this weekend I’m going to be gray.
*grrrrrrr*

Disloyal, ungrateful, spoiled girly males come in all flavors. You going to denounced the ones at Stormfront?

baldilocks

…actually…

<resume

…for about three years, I was a chaplaincy prison visitor — the FIRST and ONLY one in Texas — working with offenders professing Norse heathenism. In our nations prisons, that bunch are shot through with Stormfront, 14-words, and suchlike folks. The offenders themselves “protected” me from those folks attending, and I did my level best — visiting the facility I serviced at least once a month (when there wasn’t a lock down) for that three or so years.

I discontinued the service firstly because the state chaplaincy reorganized, and the very supportive on-site facility chaplain left, and was replaced by what I think was a lay Catholic chaplain who was as unsupportive as was the other fellow. I also washed my hands of having anything to do with Norse heathenism.

I also, for a few years, ran a discussion list along the same lines with world-wide participation where white supremacy was discussed in detail, and where (as the list owner) I routinely denounced supremacy, white or otherwise.

</resume

I’m proud of who I am, my ancestry, and their accomplishments. I’m also happy with my neighbors (Atascosa County where I live is 60% hispanic), and think that they’d be foolish not to be proud of their ancestry, etc. Same goes for blacks, but I’m seeing less pride in the media, anyway, than bitterness-on-cue, as that’s been popular for as long as it’s been possible. Comes from folks like this Howard turd not being required to stand up like a man…and his own folks not being the ones who do the requiring.